Soft scalar-mass sum rule in gauge-Yukawa unified models and its superstring interpretation

It is shown that a certain sum rule for soft supersymmetry-breaking scalar masses, which has been recently found in a certain class of superstring models, is universal for gauge-Yukawa unified models. To explain this coincidence, we argue that the low-energy remnant of the target-space duality invariance in the effective supergravity of compactified superstrings can be identified with the (broken) scale invariance in gauge-Yukawa unified models, and that gauge-Yukawa unification which is indispensable for the sum rule to be satisfied follows from the matching of anomalies.